Writing about writing

Posts tagged ‘Penzu’

The old debate rears its ugly head again: handwriting vs. typing–especially in regards to journaling. Which do you do? Which do you prefer? Why?

Over the years, I have read various articles debating the benefits of both handwriting and typing our journals. I see and value both, truly. Don’t believe me? Check out the hoard of hand-written journals cluttered around my house as well as my office at school as well as my online Penzu journal account wherein I wrote more than 150,000 words in one year!

When I type my journal, I love typing my journal. I love being able to use images in my journal. Pictures are always just a click away and so easy to insert where I want them within my journal entry. I can type pretty fast, so it takes me much less time to get down what I want to say when I type. I also just love the feel of the keys under my fingers. It’s almost like playing a piano, you know? It’s just so cool how my fingers type what I want to say without my having to think about placement of my hands or fingers on the keys. I’ve just been typing long enough now that my fingers do all the work without my having to think about it!

But wait a sec….the same is true when I hand-write something. I’ve been writing since before I ever started school, so watching the words appear on the written page is pretty awesome because my hand (my fingers) with my pen (usually pink) is flying across the page faster than I can think the words. I can write in pretty colors, like pink or purple! (But when I type my journal, I can change my font to a pretty color, too.) I do not hand-write as quickly as I type. What may take me only minutes to type will typically take me at least three times as long by hand. I do love the feel of my favorite pen in my hand and my notebook beneath as well as the sound of the scratching of my pen across the page. And the smell of a journal is as sweet as the smell of a new book! Plus, it’s so much fun to pick out a new notebook to use as a journal! I actually just bought a new purple journal the other week that I can’t wait to fill in using my new purple pen!

So which is better? Neither. Both. UGH! When I’m typing, I love typing. When I’m writing by hand, I love writing by hand! So how to choose?

One major benefit of handwriting my journal is that I have my own personal handwriting on the written page. When I am angry, it shows in my writing. When I am sad, it shows. You can literally see the smudges from my tears or the breaks when I’m frustrated or even the holes in the page where I’ve gotten so angry, I’ve smashed my pen through the paper. My emotions are not only revealed by the words I put down on the page, but even more importantly by the actual look (physical appearance) of the words on the page. The physical appearance of my hand-writing often says so much more than the words I wrote.

One negative of handwriting my journal is that I deal with carpal tunnel, so my right hand gets really sore when I write for long stretches–and yes, I typically write for no less than thirty minutes which can be interpreted as a long time in one sitting for a journal entry, I think. I try to wear my brace, but if I write by hand a lot, even my hand brace doesn’t help. I have even had to go to an orthopedic doctor to have cortisone shots in order to attempt to alleviate the pain in my wrist. Being in pain makes it extremely difficult to keep writing by hand.

Another negative of writing by hand–and a major benefit of typing–is two-fold: a digital copy of my journal is automatically created when I type my journal and I save a ton of space when typing rather than having a bunch of notebooks taking up shelf space in my home–or in my office. I like being able to open last year’s online journal and search for an entry and find it at the stroke of a few keys. With my hand-written journals, I have to try to remember which notebook I wrote in and then dig through every single page of the 100+ page of the notebook in an attempt to find what I might be looking for.

Several years ago, I wrote a story by hand. Do you think I can find that story now?! I KNOW I hand-wrote it. I remember the emotions I was feeling as my hand flew across the page. I remember how the story wrote itself because it was so powerful and meaningful for me. It is driving me absolutely nutso that I can not find it! I have searched through every single hand-written journal I have–that I can find….nothing! UGH! If I had typed it, the story would be in my database where I could do a quick search and find it!

Part of what makes that story so powerful in my memory, though, is the appearance of it on the written page. I was in such an incredibly deep emotional state of despair when I wrote that story and it shows visibly on the page. I think, more than anything else, that is why I want to find it. If I had typed the story, I don’t know that I would have had the same powerful and memorable emotions in the writing of it.

So what have I chosen? To type or to hand-write….Neither. When I feel like typing my journal, I type it. When I feel like writing by hand, I write by hand. I might go months doing one over the other. All I have to do now is figure out how to make my hand-written journals digital……!

It is amazing how much writing I did in 2014. Wow. As I look at that number, 250,000, I am shocked that I was able to write that much in a year especially a year that was very busy for me. If I counted the assignments, emails, and other documents that I write for school–my job–that number would jump up at least to 300k, I’m sure. But I chose to count only the words I wrote in my journal throughout the year.

Do you journal? You should, you know. I require my Freshman Composition students to keep an online blog for our class. Many of them balk at it and complain a lot, but by the end of the semester, there are always a few who are glad they participated in it. Every once in awhile, it is a means to draw the students in the classroom closer together–to create a sense of community that we can’t get via any other method. I love that. I personally believe that students are more open to learning and the learning process when they are comfortable in the classroom–when the classroom is a safe place where they can share without judgment. And that non-judgment includes NOT looking at or worrying about their grammar in their blog entries. They can simply what they want.

Of course it’s not a perfect system. Some students wait until the last minute to post their blog entries and that doesn’t do anything at all except give them a grade–a lower grades, but still a grade. I still have students who hate the whole process but do it because they want a good grade. And every once in a while, I have students who post things that make me wonder…..about a lot of things.

But more often than not, their blog entries are fun to read as well as worth reading. I am glad to do it. I wish I could make everyone I know write/keep a journal. I wish every single person I know would GET how healing, awesome, powerful, wonderful, and just plain cool a journal is. I know I’m in a small class of people who actually LOVE to write. I accept that truth. And regardless of whether or not anyone reads what I write or even cares about what I write, I will keep writing because I am writing for myself more than I am writing for anyone else anyway.

Just keep writing……

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I keep a journal that I attempt to write in every day. I don’t make it every single day, but this is the first year where I have written in my journal almost every day compared to previous years. Look!!!

Several years ago, I first picked up Julia Cameron’s book, The Writing Diet. I ate that book up! (See what I did there?!) Anyway, in that book, Julia speaks of her daily writing activity she calls “Morning Pages.” She discusses Morning Pages in greater detail in her other book, The Artist’s Way, but I first read about them in The writing Diet. Morning Pages are nothing more than writing three full pages every single morning–freewriting. I loved the idea, so I gave Morning Pages a shot. More often than not, I ended up doing my “Morning” Pages in the evening rather than the morning.

I felt guilty that I couldn’t get my writing done in the mornings. I wanted so much to do Morning Pages just as Julia Cameron suggested. I loved every single part of the whole idea and I wanted to be successful with it. But I could not get up early enough to do my Morning Pages in the mornings.

Then I read Mari McCarthy’s Dark Chocolate for the Journaler’s Soul wherein one of the writers shared that she, too, struggled with writing in the mornings, so she simply starting doing “Night Notes” instead.

Huh. So I didn’t HAVE to do my writing in the mornings!!! And I didn’t have to feel guilty for it! So now I write in the evenings. I prefer to type. I did a few practice entries by hand so I could give myself an estimate of the total number of words I wrote in three pages (Julia’s guidelines for Morning Pages). I found that I could write approximately 750 words in three pages, so I try to write 750 words every day in my online journal. I don’t beat myself up if I don’t make it to 750 words, mainly because there are some days when I simply do not have a lot to say, but there are other days when I write way beyond 750 words! I wish my chain would show the days I have written more than once because I have several days when I wrote two or three entries and each entry was more than 750 words.

Currently, I have written approximately 170,000 words just in my online journal this year!!!!! I will easily hit 200,000 words before the year is out! Penzu (the online journal I use) sent me a message a few months ago when I first hit 100,000 words so I can have a free year of Penzu Pro next year! So cool! (Penzu basic is free, but if you go Pro, of course, there are many options, one of which is the ability to create several journals rather than just have one. I have divided my by year as well as by other categories as I choose!)

If I am able to win NaNoWriMo, I will easily have at least 250,000 words for the year! That’s a LOT of writing!!!!! And I LOVE every last bit of it!!!! None of the numbers I’ve shared includes any of the writing I do daily for work; I teach English at a community college! And now I also have this blog as well as two other main ones that I keep! (See the link at the top of the page, “Joy Regardless.”)